


Martin Blackwood Is Perfectly Happy as a Human, Thank You.

by EmeraldAshes



Series: The Magnus Archives Oneshots [3]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: ...And Non-Living Things, Bonding, Creepy Fluff, Eventual Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Fix-It of Sorts, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Friendly Avatars, Humor, Lovecraftian Shenanigans, M/M, Martin Blackwood Needs a Hug, Martin Blackwood: Friend to All Living Things, POV Martin Blackwood, Peter Lukas Is Done With This Shit, Pining Martin Blackwood, Possibly Pre-Slash, Roombas, The Magnus Archives Season 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:35:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24971662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmeraldAshes/pseuds/EmeraldAshes
Summary: “Martin,” Peter Lukas said with barely-concealed frustration, “You have to stop befriending everything. We’ve discussed this.”Martin awkwardly attempts to join the Lonely while fending off offers from the other avatars.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood & Helen | The Distortion, Martin Blackwood & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Martin Blackwood & Jude Perry, Martin Blackwood & Michael "Mike" Crew, Martin Blackwood & Peter Lukas, Martin Blackwood & The Web
Series: The Magnus Archives Oneshots [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1804678
Comments: 11
Kudos: 155





	Martin Blackwood Is Perfectly Happy as a Human, Thank You.

**Author's Note:**

> FYI: I wrote this when I was on episode 130ish, so it might not quite fit with canon. I discovered this podcast around the time the world went into lockdown, so I'm still playing catch-up.

“...So, what you’re saying is that I’m so lonely it could be a superpower?” Martin asked the new Head of the Magnus Archives. The young researcher sat, feeling nervous and awkward, as the other man -- or whatever he was -- languidly stalked an office that felt utterly empty. No photos, no knicknacks. Not even a coffee mug.

“Not the exact wording I would choose. But yes.”

“Aren’t I already, y’know, under Elias and the Eye?”

Peter Lukas turned to regard the window. Even as the man spoke to him, Martin felt completely ignored. Like he wasn’t even there. “Under different circumstances, I suppose the Beholding would have claimed you. But you have no aptitude for it.”

Martin frowned at Peter’s back. “Really? I thought I’ve been doing pretty well. I mean, I always got decent performance reviews.”

“I’m sure you’re fine at your job, but becoming a true follower is more than that. The Beholding isn’t in your nature. When you see an open wound, your first instinct isn’t to poke your nose in it.”

Martin wrinkled his nose at the metaphor, and Peter continued, “Still, your position at the Institute has brought you close enough to be noticed. You’re right on the edge of Becoming.”

“Becoming...what?”

Peter turned to watch him, gaze pinning Martin to his seat. “I’m not sure yet. That’s what makes you interesting. Frankly, I’m surprised you haven’t been offered a position with one of the other entities.”

Martin thought of the weeks he spent trapped in his apartment, panic giving way to restless sleep until the fear woke him again. He remembered Jane Prentiss pounding on his door, calling. “Let us in. Let us in. Let us  _ inside you _ .”

He thought of Sasha, who wasn’t Sasha, who had never been Sasha, smiling at him one day as he came in after another sleepless night. “Do you even know who you are?” And when he had sputtered. “It’s alright, you know. You don’t have to be anyone at all.”

Martin met Peter’s eyes. “Tell me what I have to do.”

* * *

Martin smiled as the little spider spun down toward him, trailing a thin string of web behind it. “Well, hello there.”

Peter emerged from his office as the spider landed lightly on Martin’s desk.

Martin’s eyes darted to his boss. “Oh, sorry, did you need something?”

Peter crushed the spider with a sudden smack of his palm, then brushed it off into the trash. “You have to stop befriending everything. We’ve discussed this.”

Martin felt himself growing defensive. “It was a spider.”

“You were getting attached. Stop it. And don’t forget to finish your current project before you leave today.”

“Right,” Martin called to Peter’s retreating back. When his boss shut the door behind him, Martin turned a guilty glance toward the trash can where his eight-legged coworker had been tossed, muttering, “Sorry, Charlotte.”

The next day, he found a cobweb on his chair that looked suspiciously like the word “Hi.”

Martin awkwardly brushed it away, deciding not to mention it to Peter. When he spotted a spider peering down at him from the AC vent, however, he did give a little wave.

* * *

When Martin opened the door, the room inside was way, way bigger than it should have been. Bigger than it possibly  _ could _ have been, considering the layout of the building. He could barely make out the far wall. A woman stood just inside, peacefully still, watching him as if she had been patiently waiting for his arrival.

“This isn’t the bathroom,” Martin said, feeling like an idiot.

“No,” the woman said in a familiar voice. “You are lost.”

“I guess?” Martin hovered in the doorway. “I’ve been working here for years. I was pretty sure this was the bathroom.”

The woman stepped forward with a smile that didn’t quite fit on her face. He had the sudden, disorienting impression that if she opened her mouth, it would reveal a gaping maw. She laid a gentle hand on his cheek. “You are lost. You think you might be going mad. You are afraid.”

“Oh God.” Martin suddenly knew where he had heard that voice before. “Helen Richardson?”

“She was afraid, too. But together, we found joy in getting lost. There’s no such thing as a wrong turn.” Her fingers slipped down, taking hold of his hand and gently tugging it as she backed inside. 

“I…” Martin’s throat was dry. He had always been terrified of ending up like his mother, falling slowly and painfully into madness. And here the Distortion stood, inviting him to take a leap instead.

“Why don’t you come in?”

“I need to pee!” Martin finally blurted out, yanking his hand away and slamming the door behind him. The worst part was that it wasn’t even a lie, really. 

* * *

The Roomba was trapped at the spot in Martin’s flat where linoleum turned to carpet. It was just a bit too high for the little robot to climb, and it whirred miserably as it tried to push forward.

“It’s alright,” he told it as he picked it up and set it down on the carpet. “I’ve got you.”

Twenty minutes later, there was a knock on his door. Behind it stood a scowling Peter Lukas, who pushed his way inside and snatched up the Roomba.

“What are you…?”

“Stop. Befriending. Things,” Peter ground out.

* * *

Martin was already practicing his excuses the moment he saw the slight figure of a man standing at the edge of the Magnus Institute’s roof, arms flung out, eyes closed, hair flowing with the wind. Delicate scars crept up his neck, branching out like the limbs of a tree. 

“I just needed a break,” Martin would tell Peter. “I didn’t think anyone would be up there. I wouldn’t have said a word to him, but he looked like he might jump.”

It was all true, but it was also true that it had been weeks since Martin had spoken to another human (Peter was not human. He knew that now). He was hungry for a passing hello, a casual smile. He approached, half-cautious, half-giddy. “Are you alright?”

The stranger’s pale eyes opened. “Fine, thank you.”

“The wind’s pretty strong today. You probably shouldn’t...Oh.” Martin’s stomach dropped as he saw over the edge of the building. The institute wasn’t this tall. He wasn’t sure any building could ever be this tall. “You’re, um…”

“Mike Crew,” the man said with artificial friendliness. 

Martin smiled weakly. “You’re in some of our statements. Are you here to recruit me?”

“I wasn’t planning to, but I could if you like.”

“No thank you,” Martin said quickly. “Why are you here then?”

“I came to kill the Archivist. But I hear he’s in Siberia.”

“Right. He does that. Travels for work, I mean. Trying to save the world and all that.”

“That sounds exciting,” Mike remarked without an ounce of enthusiasm. “Is saving the world part of your job?”

“Kind of.”

“Do they pay you for it?”

“Not enough,” Martin said with a half-hearted chuckle. “Why is it you want to kill Jon, anyway, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“He led a hunter to my home, and she shot me in the head. Then he helped her bury me.”

“Oh."

“I probably won’t kill him, if he apologizes,” Mike added. 

This conversation was weird. Unsettling. Might lead to him being chucked off the roof. But at least he was talking to a person, sort of. 

“So!” Martin said brightly. “How about this weather lately?”

* * *

“Come on,” Martin muttered. “You can do it. Just a few more bars. There you go!”

Peter stalked into the room, glaring as Martin sweet-talked his computer. “You’re really not good at this isolation thing, are you?”

* * *

First, Martin called 999. Then, he called Peter.

“Hey,” he said, fighting to keep the panic out of his voice. “I promise I’m not just calling to talk this time. I learned my lesson. I really did. I just needed...”

The windows in his flat shattered. Tendrils of fire flicked out like tongues, tasting the air outside while they consumed everything he owned. Martin had called Peter, who wouldn’t pick up. Of course he wouldn’t. Peter wanted him to know how alone he was.

Martin listened to the distant wail of fire trucks. He cleared his throat. “I just needed to let you know that I won’t be in on Monday. Thanks.”

He had deleted every number in his phone. Avoiding temptation. But he still remembered one. He punched in the numbers. “Hey Jon! My flat just burned down. Want to get breakfast?”

* * *

“It was my fault, really,” Martin confessed over a plate of blueberry pancakes. “I woke up, and there was this woman standing over me. She was kind of short and muscly --”

“Jude Perry,” Jon said.

“You know her?”

Jon gestured toward the burn scar on his hand. “We’ve met.”

“Right. Well, she was offering me a place with The Desolation. Launched right into this big speech about it”

Jon raised an eyebrow. “Burn it all?”

“Pretty much,” Martin agreed. “Mostly, I was trying to figure out how she got into my flat. But I also figured I should hear her out, since she’d gone through all the trouble of breaking in.”

Jon snorted, stabbing at his eggs. “Is that the etiquette?”

Martin wondered how the other man would react if he squirted syrup at him. “I was sort of nodding along, asking a question here and there. I had been in a ‘burn it all’ sort of mood lately, and I started thinking about the Institute and Peter and how this didn’t sound all that different. So I asked if they had a benefits package.”

Jon choked on his eggs, then started to laugh. “ _ Martin. _ ”

“I know, I know,” Martin said, laughing with him.

“What did she do then?”

“Then, she set my flat on fire.”

Jon winced, laughter stopping abruptly. “I am sorry about that.”

“It’s alright,” Martin said, trying not to think about everything that he’d lost. “I haven’t really been there much lately, anyway.”

For a while, they were quiet, letting themselves be distracted by the mechanical act of cutting and chewing. Jon finally said, “Why was Jude trying to recruit you, anyway?”

Martin shrugged, toying with the lump of butter on his plate. “It’s been a thing ever since Peter took me on. Longer, maybe. Avatars keep popping out of dark corners and trying to get me on their team. Why? You want to have a go at it?”

“No,” Jon said.

Martin kept his eyes on his plate. “Right. Peter mentioned. I’m not really a good fit for the Beholding, am I?”

Jon reached forward, lightly touching the back of his hand. “Martin, if there’s anyone I would want on my side, it’s you.”

"Oh. Um, thank you," Martin stuttered out, looking up at Jon for any sign that this was a joke or maybe a dream.

“I just don’t see why you have to join any of the Entities,” Jon said and then, casually undoing months of work by Peter Lukas, added, “I like you just fine as you are.”

Martin stared at him, speechless and almost glad for it. If he started talking now, he was definitely going to say something he would regret later.

Jon smiled. “You should stay with me.”

“I should?” Martin asked.

“Of course,” Jon said in that slightly confused, slightly condescending tone of his. Like it was obvious. “Your flat burned down.”

If Jon had asked in that moment, Martin would have happily joined his freaky apocalypse cult. Instead, he just smiled back. “That sounds nice.”


End file.
